Pellicer, Miquel and Piraino, Patrizio (2019) The Effect of Nonpersonnel Resources on Educational Outcomes: Evidence from South Africa. Economic Development and Cultural Change, 67 (4). pp. 907-934. ISSN 0013-0079

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Abstract

Little credible evidence exists on the effect of nonpersonnel school expenditures on educational outcomes in developing countries. This paper studies the impact of nonpersonnel funding on school outcomes exploiting the peculiar way in which these resources are allocated in South Africa. Government funding follows quintiles constructed on the basis of school poverty scores. This creates discrete jumps in the allocation of funding, and we use a regression discontinuity approach to analyze its effects on school outcomes at the end of high school. Our results show a small but positive effect of resources on student throughput during the last years of high school and on the number of students writing the matriculation exam. However, additional resources do not translate into a higher number of successful exams, leading to an overall negative effect on pass rates. We suggest that these findings may have to do with schools reacting to the per-pupil nature of funding.

Item Type:	Article
Keywords:	Educational finance; Public spending; Regression analysis; Educational outcomes; High schools; South African economic policy;
Academic Unit:	Faculty of Social Sciences > Economics, Finance and Accounting
Item ID:	16298
Identification Number:	https://doi.org/10.1086/700103
Depositing User:	Miquel Pellicer
Date Deposited:	13 Jul 2022 08:36
Journal or Publication Title:	Economic Development and Cultural Change
Refereed:	Yes
URI:	Publisher
Use Licence:	This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available here

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